In light of current challenges to higher education across the nation, a professor from the University of Arizona held a guest lecture on campus Thursday to address topics of “academic capitalism” and its relevance to the University of Wisconsin.

Professor Gary Rhoades said over the last 25 years there has been an “acceleration of the past” in higher education. He called President Barack Obama’s rhetoric “Kennedy-esque,” by comparing his goal of having 50 percent more U.S. citizens complete community college degrees by 2020 to Kennedy’s 1961 speech about putting man on the moon.

Rhoades said the majority of federal support for higher education goes to for-profit schools, which puts further strain on public universities like UW that aim to maximize excellence in conjunction with affordability.

In light of the current state budget lapse, Rhoades said instead of emphasizing the inevitable dwindling state support in discussions on higher education policy, society should focus on the bigger picture.

The general public, Rhoades said, is oftentimes left in the dark about what goes on in large research universities like UW, leading some to be cynical of its relevance to their lives. Citing UW’s role in public health and education, he said we must “puncture the demonizing view of what we do.”

Rhoades shared an anecdote about a student from Rutgers University who told him she had always associated debt with “making bad choices.”

The student chose a public university specifically to avoid the burden of debt, yet found herself swamped in loans by her junior year. Rhoades said this is a point at which the system has betrayed America’s youth.

Henry Richardson, an employee at the mailroom of UW-Extension and union member, said he thinks greater diversity in decision-making committees at UW would be beneficial.

“There are six or seven committees made up of a token student, a union representative and the rest are mostly HR representatives that do not genuinely have the best interest of faculty members in mind. We need to have more balanced committees,” Richardson said.

Rhoades also appealed to the union protests last year, saying although unions did not come out on top in Wisconsin, it was this fervor that stimulated and inspired groups far from campus, such as We Are Ohio, that did successfully kill union reform legislation.

“If we don’t make changes now, it spells out trouble in 10-15 years,” Rhoades said. 

Associated Students of Madison Student Council Chair Allie Gardner attended the lecture and said the message that students are at the forefront of changing the discourse of higher education was highly applicable.

“To alter discourse and build the necessary coalitions, pressure needs to be applied to our decision-makers, and we need to engage the greater Wisconsin community,” she said. “Who better to do that then us”?